God's Greater Story
Hope, real hope is only found in God’s Greater Story – Creation, Fall, Redemption, Re-creation. His story explains why things aren’t the way they were meant to be, what He has done about it, and how He one day promises to set all things right. Fellowship member David Arms’ painting, The Greater Story, visually depicts each chapter. Living outside this story is to live without real hope. But when we join it – believing the story is true for us – we discover a hope that does not disappoint.
None of us would argue that while this world is a marvel and wonder, it is also a place of incredible difficulty and hardship. It seems that something is wrong with everything. There are greenhouse gases that threaten the environment, political unrest, terrorism, viruses (digital and biological), and a host of other wrongs too numerous to mention.
There is something wrong with everything, and when we sit still long enough, we sense there is even something deeply wrong within us. We’re broken. We don’t show it on the outside, but we sure feel it on the inside. There are longings in our hearts that nothing satisfies, and when we try to satisfy them, rather than discovering contentment, we often find insecurity, fear, shame and guilt.
The Bible describes that brokenness as sin. We could describe sin in this way: it is choosing anything other than God to satisfy the deep longings of our hearts. When we choose anything other than God, we sin.
We can also describe sin as missing the mark of perfection—total and complete righteousness. God is perfect in character, totally without sin, and completely righteous. Scripture tells us that we were made to live in a relationship with God. That relationship begins now and lasts forever (John 3:16), but because of our sin, the relationship is broken.
Not only are we separated from God by sin, but the Scripture tells us that the penalty for sin is death (Romans 6:23). Like a wage one earns for an hour of labor, sin earns the wage of death (Romans 6:23).
If you are tracking with me so far, the news, if we are willing to really face it, is not very good. We’re broken, and in our brokenness, we choose things other than relationship with God to relieve the pain of that brokenness. We do what God says not to do, and we don’t do what God says to do.
Take a look at the first two frames of the painting, The Greater Story. This explains why we are where we are. In Creation, God made the world and all that was in it. Adam and Eve had everything needed for life, not just physically, but spiritually as well. They “walked” with God. However, when they were presented with the idea that maybe God was holding out on them, they bit. They decided there was a better way to live than walking with God, and they went their own way (Genesis 3).
The result was that second frame in the painting. Death, darkness, destruction. Brokenness. It is a visual picture of the cost of sin. And the Bible teaches that because Adam and Eve were the parents of all humanity, all of us are born broken, sinful, bent on finding life apart from God (Romans 5:12).
Amazingly, right there in the midst of their rebellion in the garden, God promises Adam and Eve that one day a man would be born of a woman who would set right all that they had made wrong and would crush the evil one who had led them to do so (Genesis 3:15). Yes, all men would die and be separated from God because of sin, but God promised to make a way in which sin’s penalty could be satisfied and people could be restored to relationship with Him.
That’s the third frame in the painting: God’s promise represented by the colors of the rainbow, and God’s payment for sin represented by the scarlet ribbon extending down the right side.
This is the good news of the gospel. It is the good news of the life, death and resurrection of God’s own son, Jesus Christ.God sent His son Jesus to live a perfect life, a life perfect in character, totally without sin, and completely righteous. He lived the kind of life required for one to be in relationship with God. God also sent His son Jesus to die on a cross and pay the penalty of sin. The good news for us is that Jesus died because of our sin, not His own. He took everything we have ever done wrong, are doing wrong, or will do wrong upon Himself and paid the penalty for it by dying.
Having satisfied the penalty for sin by dying and absorbing the wrath of God against sin, after three days in the grave Jesus rose again. He rose because death could not hold Him. Death can only hold those with sin, but Jesus had none of His own (Romans 5:18-19).
In redemption, Jesus pays for our sin with His life. And then He offers His life of perfect righteousness to us. The death we deserve, He pays. The life we don’t deserve, He gives.
This is the good news of the gospel as told in God’s Greater Story.
Our response is to turn from seeking life apart from God, to face God, and from our hearts tell Him that we personally trust in Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. It is to believe that He lived a life I could never live, He paid a debt I could never pay, and His righteousness is now mine by faith.
If you believe that the gospel is true, and that it is true for you, can I invite you to put your faith in it? Read the previous paragraph. If that is the desire of your heart, then speak to God about it, right now. Speak from your heart. It is not the words you say that bring salvation, it is the faith of your heart that your words are expressing.
If you would like to talk about this decision with me, I’d love to discuss it with you. You can contact me through e-mail ().
Now take a look at that last frame in The Greater Story painting. God has promised that there is coming a day when He will set all things right as they should be, forever and ever and ever. For those who are in a relationship with Him through Jesus Christ, that day will be the most glorious of days…and it will never end. Death will be no more, tears will be wiped away and pain will cease. In the re-creation, we will once again “walk” with God as Adam and Eve did, but in the mystery of God’s glory and grace, it will be even better than the original garden. Amazing (Revelation 21-22).
Lloyd Shadrach, Teaching Pastor
